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test drive meme

+ SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER TDM +

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER TEST DRIVE MEME
It's Chinese for 'Japan.'

Prompt A: Serious Event

A memory is displayed. It's yours, the most traumatic of your life whether it was a terrifying clown encounter or the death of someone you love. It's on a loop for everyone to see. You can enter the memory and take your own place, but no matter how hard you try, you cannot alter the outcome. You're forced to try in vain to change what happened or watch until you decide it's too much and walk away. If you can.

Prompt B: Lighter Event

Welcome to Storybrooke.

You've lived in a quiet town in Maine for as long as you can remember. You are a fishmonger or a diner employee, perhaps you work at the hospital. Whatever you do and whoever you are, it's not the real you. You are cursed and you know no other life outside of Storybrooke.

When the curse breaks (either from True Love's Kiss or, in a more TDM friendly, handwaved way), you have two sets of memories: who you were, and who you are. Do you choose to accept all that you were cursed to believe, or would you rather slip back into your old life? The choice is yours.

Prompt C: ediS rorriM

Use this prompt to test out your mirrors. Are they loyal to the new White Queen or do they think she's too good to be true? Do they long to cross over or spend their days tormenting reals? Whatever the scenario, know that the Queen is watching, and let that guide you - or not.

Prompt D: Choices

Any scenario goes! Thread out your character's arrival, have them act like a long-established resident, let our past events inspire your scene, or write up literally any Wonderland-based scenario you feel like playing with.

Rules

Test drive memes go up every other month. Please note that any threads made as part of the test drive meme don't count towards your activity check, and they can't be used as samples for any future applications. Thank you for understanding, and have fun!

NAVIGATION ♥ RESERVES ♥ APPLICATION ♥ INPUT & INQUIRIES

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Well one, I think people flock to those like them. It's how me and my best friend met," she points out. It's a theory she believes in, at least. "Amanda? Is she the hottie with you and the dork at the table?"

She blinks at that. "Whoa, wait, believing you're burning to death is a hereditary trait? That's new," she admits, though she laughs as he goes on, shrugging.

"I don't have one, so I'm checking out others. None of the horrible in my life haunts me so my room is just like normal. Well, not normal, but it's just this fight between me and my bestie and I know it ends with us making up and having the best prom night ever." Again, best for her, not the dead people, or the sheriff who believes his son hung himself, or the teacher that got her throat cut. But there was one less serial killer in the world after they shot him to cover for what they did.

Todd laughs. It makes his whole face scrunch up. "No, that's Farah, she's our, um, partner I guess? She put in the money to start the business. Amanda's my little sister. She has the same condition I do, she's had it a lot longer though. She's the one who calls me in a few moments."

And sure enough, in the memory, he answers the phone, relief turning to fear and horror.

"It's neurological. We have hallucinations that things are happening to us, horrific things, and we experience it like it was really happening." He tells himself it's not real, but it doesn't actually make it hurt any less.

"I guess that's good, though, that your worst moment is something that you know turns out just fine. I mean you're what? Nineteen? Eighteen? Probably best if your life doesn't have anything too horrible yet."

Most people find her bluntness and in your face curiosity disturbing, that he laughs it off and answers her is impressive to Sadie. "She's hot. Just saying," she says, though her gaze goes to Todd's image, the call he took.

"So what happened? Why are you freaking out?" In other words, why is this your worst memory, without in depth putting that in his face.

"When it happens, like then,' she says, gesturing. "Can you feel it? Pain is all in the head, so you can feel it, can't you?" She tries hard not to sound excited by that thought.

She stares at him for a minute. "Eighteen, and just graduated," she admits. "Bad things happen in my life, but doesn't feel horrible, I guess. Nothing like pain that isn't there tormenting me." And she means it. It's nothing like that.

The last three months have greatly increased Todd's tolerance to weird. "Yeah, she is. Farah is without a doubt the coolest, hottest person I have ever met." He says nothing about them personally; he doesn't do that to Farah or with strangers.

"My sister, who isn't talking to me, has just called, shouting that they're after her, that they're being attacked and she's running. I didn't get anything more than that because, attack. By the time I recovered, she'd long since hung up and pulled the sim and battery from her phone. She's okay now. Probably in the best place in her life that she's ever been." He sounds proud. He is proud; Amanda is about a million times the person he hopes to be and it comes naturally to her.

"Yeah. It's not real, but it's real to me at the time. Amanda nearly died once when she thought she was drowning, she nearly ruptured her diaphragm." And fuck, eighteen seems a lifetime ago. "Yeah, I get that. You know they're bad but you just don't feel it like you know you should."

"So that's why you're just standing there then? Is that it? Because you know it all works out?" It's why none of it could bother her. "Okay, I have to ask. Who was after her? Was it like the mob, or was it the cops?"

She feared so much she might one day have to answer to the cops, but in the end it all worked out. Now she's in Wonderland though, and she is still working out what this place means to her and what she's going to do.

"Whoa." And she is shocked by that, though it's kind of impressive. "Jesus, that's nuts. Wow." She shakes her head, just not even sure what to think of that. Though she shrugs at that. "My boyfriend hung himself because his mom died in a car accident when we were kids. I figure if he's out of pain, then I'm glad for him."

She does love slipping those things in since back home they're infamous for surviving a massacre.

"I don't really want to go and look at other people's lowest moments." And it's the only chance he has to see Farah and Dirk. It might be a memory, and an awful one, but seeing Farah relaxed and Dirk so alight with happiness... it makes him miss them a tiny bit less.

"Neither. They weren't even interested in her, they wanted the guys she was travelling with. The, uh, energy vampires."

Pararibulitis kills. Amanda had broken her arm once during an attack; Todd had never found out the specifics about it. Hadn't wanted to know. "Oh. That's pretty rough." He didn't say sorry, because he was trying to be more honest and he wasn't really sorry. He didn't her or him to be sorry. "You seem okay now, though."

"There's the diner. Most are gathering there. Or sitting in the hallways. I figured someone might be doing something stupid, so decided to check them out."

Which isn't true. She's wanting to peek in, seeing their pain and sorrow and get a bit of what she feels she is missing in Wonderland. Especially without her other half there.

"That's not surprising. Bet they have a lot of enemies. The vampires here all talk about it," she says, having talked to a few of them. Not that she's made the admission, but sometimes they talk about humanity in ways she can totally relate to.

"He made his choice,' she says, repeating something she's said in interview before, though then with a few more tears. "What did you do before this all started looping? Did you go for her? Your sister?"

Todd shrugs. He doesn't want to admit he's staying here to watch Farah and Dirk. "I don't really know anyone. Not really social either."

The Rowdies don't really have many enemies. They're far too effective are terrifying and draining opposition into submission. "Honestly? Not really. They're not vampires like in books and movies, Dracula and Nosferatu. They're psychic vampires. They prefer to feed on fear." They especially prefer Dirk's fear.

"You mean, what did I really do? Yeah, we went looking. For Amanda and Blackwing, the people who attacked them." For Amanda and for Dirk.

"It's not doing you any good," she says. Not even admonishing. Just noting that he is, because she finds that curious. Most try and avoid their pain.

She arches a brow, watching as his vision counterpart caught fire once more. "None of the vampires here are like that. Except they feed on blood, I guess. It's kind of interesting. I always wonder if they're razors and just suckle it off or if they are straws." No one should wonder about that, probably.

"Yeah, where you went after the call instead of it going over and over again," she says. "What the hell is Blackwing?" Digging into people's lives, their pain, it helps a lot in this place.

"No. It's not hurting me either. It's nice to see my friends." He turns slowly to look at her, clearly weirded out about that line of thought, but not actually scared. "I guess it depends on the person and the vampire and their arrangement?" he supposes.

"Farah found me. I don't know what happened, I came to in the afternoon back in my apartment with her. And Blackwing are the people who were after the Rowdies. And after Dirk."

"Huh. That's good then. I'm kind of holding out hope on the friend thing some talk about. You know, how people you know end up here too? Though my luck would be it's my ex, or the crazy serial killer in our town who killed a bunch of people," she says with a sigh and a shrug.

"Yah, I guess about the vampires, but I still wonder. I guess I could ask eventually."

She gave him a deadpan look. "I got they're the ones chasing them, but is that like the government? A private company? A emo heavy metal band?" She pauses and then... "Wait, do you still have them here?"

"Isn't your ex dead? Like, you literally just mentioned him a minute ago." Crazy serial killing is not as abstract as it once was, not after seeing what the Men of the Machine were willing to do.

"Dirk will turn up eventually. He's a holistic detective, he always ends up where he needs to be." And Todd needs him to be here. Hopefully with Farah.

"I- government. I'm pretty sure." He was fairly sure. Given their sway with agencies. "Pararibulitis attacks? Yeah, of course. It doesn't go away because I've gone somewhere different."

"Yeeeeah," she says, nodding slowly. "You haven't been here long have you? Dead come back. People come in from the past and never know you. They come in from the future and you're dead. Just because he hung himself doesn't mean he won't show up one day." There is a very blase tone to her words as she says it, even if he can finger her for a lot.

"Wait, a what? Like, isn't that the whole thing about eating organic and shit?" Nope, never heard this in those terms.

"This isn't a normal place, you know. Like I said, the dead are alive, you come back from the dead. Wait, you knew that right?"

"Like, three days," he admits. "And that is horrifying and so not a good thing. Not that there are many dead people in my past." But a Farah or Dirk who didn't know him? That would be hard.

"No, it's more to do with the interconnectedness of everything. The universe takes Dirk where he needs to go to fix things that never should have happened in the first place. It's impossible to explain without sounding like a total lunatic." He is very aware of that.

"I gathered that you can't die here. Or, you can, but it doesn't stick. Bart would hate this place." So much. "But I still have pararibulitis, it's neurological."

"Oh well... Okay, that sucks. Walking in on this, that's so much bullshit," she says, realizing that he hasn't run into any of this before now. "Yeah, it's... I mean, I want my bestie here, you know? But what if there's other timelines or something? If she never knew me."

Now that is a fear she can have, one that she truly fears. She gets that worry.

Turning away from the image before her, she focuses on this man. "Okay, so... All of that can happen. People you don't know. People that look like someone you know and aren't. So... I mean, this interconnectedness could mean sure, he shows. But might get you sucked out of here quick," she notes. "Though, I mean, so in that if he came here, he'd figure this all out?"

Now that is curious. "How do you know he can do that? And what about magic? What if that helps you with the pararibwhatchihaveit."

"I've only know Dirk and Farah for... three months. And Dirk was missing for two of those. But I don't want to imagine not having met them."

Toss shrugs, watching the memory, watching the way Dirk looks at him, full of excitement and happiness and sugar. "If he was meant to. The case I met him on involved a self fulfilling, closed time loop, which wouldn't have resolved if he hadn't been involved. But if he's not meant to, nothing."

Bart killed who she felt like killing and she always felt like killing objectively terrible people. Really terrible. "I know he can do it because I've been with him when he does it. It's frustrating as hell and terrifying but it works out. And so far nothing has really helped much except my medication."

And being in Wendimoor, where thought and reality overlap a bit more than they should.

"Not like it sticks, you know. You go home, everything's normal and you go back too your life," she points out, blase about it though this part she gets. "It's what I keep telling myself because my girl isn't here either," she points out.

Being comforting is hard, but at least she can try. Maybe. Probably badly. "Look. If that's the way this guy operates? Then he's probably going end up here sooner than later. So you're just torturing yourself when it sounds like you're already living with torture," she points out. "Have you eaten or anything?"

"That's... not exactly as comforting as I think you think it is." But he looks amused, so it's working at least a little bit.

"Dirk is where Dirk's meant to be. I don't know if that applies across all realities, though. And I'm really not torturing myself, just... enjoying seeing my friends." He's torturing himself, it's a habit he's picked up since he actually admitted to himself how awful a person he was.

"Yeah, I've eaten. I don't spend all my time staring at this until I collapse. If I don't look after myself, it can bring on attacks."

"What? The whole time is frozen and everyone is waiting for you thing?" She thinks it's that part, though she's kind of accepted that some will look at her oddly. Faking being other than she is just isn't worth it sometimes.

"If you believed that you wouldn't be torturing yourself standing here watching them," she points out, not buying his denial. Not at all.

"You sleep in here still, don't you?"

"Time is frozen?" That specific detail had not been divulged.

"Where else am I going to sleep? I like having a bed, I've gone a long time without beds before, they're a luxury I enjoy."

"Let me guess. All anyone brought up was the events trying to kill you, huh?" She rolls her eyes, though she got the same thing when she arrived. "Okay, so... While you're here? NO one is moving on without you, you're not let behind and they haven't found a new Bee Efe Efe," she says, her voice a bit rougher than she means, so smiling to soften that. "So they're just waiting. Whatever moment it was when you came here? You'll go right back into it whenever they sent you back."

Which is comforting for some, weird for others.

"Pick a random room? There's some still open, I'm sure. Someone else's where you don't care about the memory they're living through?"

"Sort of, yeah. Though this one is decidedly less murdery. Murderous, Jesus, I spend too much time listening to Dirk." He wasn't sure how to feel about that, that things would happen to him, change him, but when he got back, it would be like he hadn't gone for even a second.

"That's... fucked up. Not outside the realm of what can happen to us anyway, but still, fucked up. And other people's memories tend to be noisier on the whole. But yeah, when I need sleep, might try and find somewhere else."

"Except it's meant to kill your spirit," she points out, meaning it. Not even kidding. If she had one, something like this would do it for her, and she knows it. "Also, murdery sounds about right," she adds, amused by that and smiling at the thought.

"You could, I don't know, crash in my room. There's nothing going on there. Just, if you make a mess, you'll pay."

"Well, there's a cheerful fucking thought," Todd murmured. "I knew a holistic assassin, it's the sort of word she'd use." He wondered what had happened to Bart.

"Only mess'd be if I had an attack and flailed and I can clean up after myself. Adult living and all."

"So don't let it. That's the cheerful thought in it. You can't always protect yourself when they send monsters and demons and all, but when they're after your soul, only you can protect yourself," she points out.

She considers him for a long minute, head canting. "If you actually have a whole mental thing and clean it up? I won't punish you."

She might mean that.

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